As a director, Ben Affleck is following up his critical success on “Gone Baby Gone” with another crime thriller adaptation set in Boston., Based on Prince of Thieves by Chuck Hogan, “The Town” appears to be one of those cops-and-robbers tales where the both sides get equal time and a woman is in between them. This time, Affleck is the main robber, Don Draper Jon Hamm is the cop (G-man, actually), and Rebecca Hall (“Vicky Christina Barcelona,” “Please Give“) is the woman who is, naturally, caught between them. Jeremy Renner and Blake Lively are also about.

My thoughts — this appears to have a good cast, but I wonder if director Affleck should have had second thoughts about casting himself and not his, say, his brother or, really, anyone else. True, in my view he’s gotten perhaps a little too much crap for his acting over the years. He’s been very good in a number of supporting roles. He also has been pretty darn weak in some crucial leading roles. We’ll see. Also, I didn’t love Affleck’s earlier cops-and-criminals drama quite as much as most critics, so we’ll see about this one.